plutocracy

Welcome to yet another video weekend courtesy of this blog. No need to go bankrupt in your nearest cinema or lose much time searching for videos which grow you as a person rather than dumbing you down like so much of the corporate entertainment does. Have some laughs, shed some tears, and learn how to fight our rigged system while you relax, maybe with friends and family, watching these videos. Be sure to share them.

The first video (from the The Jimmy Dore Show) covers a variety of topics: Brexit, solidarity, presidential power and failure to use it — doom of journalism and the hubris and lack of concern and sympathy among the privileged and sheltered lucky ones in a profession that is falling apart — the awful mentality of the establishment’s henchmen and handmaidens such as those self-satified shills in the corporate media — how Obama became a sell-out instead of a hero — and Kamala Harris’ corruption:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for “Moyers & Company” and the title: “Obama’s Three Biggest Failures – Not What You Think”)

Death to master-thieves in other countries. Elevation to pharaoh status in ours. Wait… didn’t we make war on this very same overseas government once?

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for “Moyers & Company” and the title: “3 Criminal Bankers Sentenced To DEATH!”)

No kidding, but even the spare time activity of golf is part of the establishment’s schemes against us now! — Private elite universities also leech off us even as we ourselves can no longer afford basic college. — Our national price-gouging and political bribing by Big Pharma is a big problem and we are forbidden to buy medication from cheaper places, even as our blood-sucking drug companies themselves are permitted to do what we are not: to buy cheaper Canadian drugs. And after they buy them cheap, as we are not allowed to, they get to sell them to us at a steep markup to pad their wallets, all watched over by our FDA for drug safety, of course. The latter means that all this quacking and clucking about safety risks when buying medicine from Canada is nothing but a baldfaced lie. — Our low taxes on corporations are only high in theory but quite low in practice (and, yet, our biggest corporations evade them anyway). — Researchers are being bought by corporations just like politicians are (global warming denial anyone?). — Scapegoating of immigrants is an old game of pulling the wool over our eyes. — Last but not least, taxing should happen where the money is, not where it’s lacking:

Hmm… the rich person I once intimately knew sure enough spent much of her time in this iconic rich people’s pastime.

Richard Wolff quote: “… profit grabbing… using the power of your business to control the politics to give you yet another benefit on top of all of those you’ve purchased before.”

Have you wondered how our oligarchs report low unemployment to celebrate our nation and its “recovery” from the last stock market crash when our economy declines and sucks in reality? You simply don’t count unemployed people who have given up looking for jobs they know are not there; and you count people pushed into poverty as employment success when the growing number of working poor in an economy which increasingly squeezes us to our limits reflects the disappearing middle class. You can now find the conditions of poor, low-wage China right here in the U.S.:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for “Moyers & Company” and the title: “Unemployment – Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics – Richard Wolff”)

Conclusion: We have a working class out of work (with some of us not completely out of work but underemployed and underpaid, so maybe not out of work, but out of life). Any wonder that our economy sucks?

Somehow I felt like sharing this one (with no further comment)… It kind of fits in with all that I-don’t-care-about-others-thinking which has poisoned our society, killing the solidarity we need to stand up for our rights, and which defines our establishment:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for “Moyers & Company” and the title: “Don’t judge people you don’t know ( you will cry after watching )”)

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For sane people, the Charlottesville Murder was either a psy-ops trick or a lunatic’s egress of identity politics with which we, the 99%, are constantly divided from above to stop us from rising up to fix our country so it becomes a good place for everyone. The brutish and idiotic murder cannot be justly explained any other way. Wage slaves hating on each other over superficial stuff like skin color is simply not justifiable as a sane act. Rather, it is the mark of being manipulated from above. And when Steve Grumbine rants about people being too lazy to try and understand economics, he is simply pointing at the elephant in the room so many of us fail to see: the origin of Money in Politics. We all realize that Money in Politics is what turns our own government against us, instead of it serving us, as it is supposed to. Many of us realize that Money in Politics turns our economy against us. But the thing, that too many people still are “too lazy” (or to afraid) to do, is to follow the money and realize that it is our flawed economic system itself that creates the concentration of Big Money (in a few privileged hands) which then gives rise to Money in Politics in the first place. It’s a vicious circle, one part of which too many of us still don’t see.

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Noam Chomsky gives a good account on how social isolation and predatory/parasitic selfishness (euphemistically presented as individuality), when adopted as an alternative to social awareness and appreciation of civilization, causes havoc among us and has given us our current mess:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Noam Chomsky Destroys Libertarianism”)

I find that Lee Camp is often better in his rants than his Redacted Tonight show. In this one, he debunks the neoliberal “Democrats’” latest effort to scam us and the political monopoly formed by our party duopoly:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “The Democrats Try to Rebrand Their Corruption: QUICK TAKE”)

Dug up from over a year ago, worth watching again or not to have missed, a great rant by Lee Camp (except for his repeating the common mistake of equating free market with capitalism when, in reality, capitalism is a force which ensures that only the biggest (the richest) bullies are free, free to subjugate everyone else). Our “free” market and “free” country are free only for the rich. The best kinds of slaves don’t know they are slaves:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “[92] Truth About The Drug War, Hillary’s Emails Are Being Censored, You Are Not Free & more “)

The current state of our kleptocracy, Henry Wallace, neoliberal philosophy is a form of extremism, and 2008 is coming again:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Dr. Richard Wolff – Is the Global Financial Crisis Close?”)

I admit to great reluctance sharing the next video. I cannot stand Stefan Molyneux’s arrogance, nor his ill-conceived stance that government must be abolished without anything to replace it. He is, of course, right that, currently, our government is being abused by our human parasites and predators as a tool against us, and also in proposing that government will always be at risk of being usurped and subverted this way by these “human farmers,” as he calls them. For reasons of attitudinal blindness or possible self-serving motivations, as someone who lives comfortably high in our dungheap society, he refuses to see or admit that these same “human farmers” would continue to exploit and oppress us even more unhindered if there were no government around, and that government – as a force which we, the people, can control if we act smartly enough – is the one major force we can bring to bear against these “human farmers.” Molyneux does, however, very nicely present the enslavement of human beings by other human beings, especially the dire fact that the most efficient form of slavery is the kind which gives the slaves the illusion that they are free and a limited range of choices within which to become more productive. Mentality and perception are indeed the key to our injustice machine of a society, and Molyneux description of us unprivileged working class folks as our oligarchs’ “livestock” is really fitting. I find they really do treat and regard us like livestock. Still, while Molyneux’s analysis is worth mulling over, his conclusion is anything but. (I guess, Molyneux is probably a star among the alt-right and/or Ayn Rand style libertarians.) So, I recommend this video (which apparently has had over 6 million views!) with a grain of salt. Please do not let yourself be deluded into its conclusion that eliminating government without something to replace it with as a guardian against the human predators and parasites among us is the course to take. I would also advise against watching more of his videos. The ones I have come across in the past were all… what’s a good word for that… uhm… let’s say beyond the pale.

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “The Story of Your Enslavement”)

So, I hope you took the grain of salt before watching this video (at least its conclusion).

Chris Hedges was moving as always:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Chris Hedges Best Speech In 2017”)

Hundreds of billions of tax gifts to the super-rich (who can’t even feel them), paid for by cuts to Medicaid among other things and another devious calculation (4 billion dollars saved by letting 200,000 older people die early in the next ten years):

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Who Will Win the Coming Democratic Civil War? “)

By the way, I contacted the Patriotic Millionaires, proposing they help finance my work. I wanted to see how serious they are, and give my financial betters the chance to put their money where their mouths are. I never heard back. One of many indications that people at or near the top who talk a good game don’t necessarily walk much of the walk, and that those who benefit from our society’s rigging may be willing to place a band-aid here or there, or perform a little tweak, but don’t really want to fix the system.

The “Democratic” Party Digging its Own Grave:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Julian Assange Explains Why The Democrats Are Doomed”)

Quote: “The Democrat establishment needs the support of the security sector and media barons to push this diversionary conspiracy agenda…” (He is referring to the – so far still baseless – Russiagate hysteria.)

Richard D. Wolff on gentrification, legalization of gambling and marijuana as a way of not taxing the rich, betrayal of the American voter, free trade, deregulation, tax cuts for the rich and gutting of welfare to allegedly make the poor work harder, anti-governmental revenge politics… BITTER politics… This video is about an hour long and starts out a bit slow, but towards the middle and the end there come really valuable news and sharp insights:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Economic Update: Capitalism’s Self-Destruction”)

And now to a much overlooked and ignored, but very important, topic:

It is high time we take a look at how our oligarchs not only rig the system in our country but the rest of their global empire, as well. I have occasionally exposed our oligarchs’ dark deeds in the Middle East before and once also shown a light on Venezuela. Venezuela is actually far more important than most U.S. Americans currently realize. Venezuela has the largest oil reserves on the planet! Let that sink in! It also replaced classical dictatorship back in 1958 with a political system mirroring ours: three branches, two corrupt parties passing power between them and enriching their own (and their plutocrat cronies’) pockets while the majority of the nation became ever more impoverished. Then, Hugo Chavez sparked off a political revolution. That’s correct! A political, not an armed revolution. He was their Bernie Sanders, not the awful “dictator” as which our corporate media kept defaming him! Venezuela apparently has clean elections (unlike us!!!), confirmed by hundreds of international observers! Venezuela (constantly decried in our corporate media as a despotic commie country) actually has it written in its constitution that the people (yes, the people, not unreliable, bribable representatives in Congress) can impeach the president and trigger an automatic election. All they need is enough signatures. Imagine that!

Now, when you put all these things together, you get a mix of circumstances which practically SCREAMS for intervention by our oligarchs, to secure the oil and stamp out the kind of political revolution that might topple them from their own thrones right here at home in the States if it were to leak over our border and catch on here.

Let that sink in! And so, unsurprisingly, our oligarchs have been putting pressure on Venezuela ever since they realized that Hugo Chavez wasn’t just talk but the real deal.

This is what that looks like when they don’t stage an outright military invasion (like they so often do in the Middle East) but prefer to try regime change closer to home in the Americas through infiltration and financing rebel-rousing insurrection by local plutocrats:

An introductory summary:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Abby Martin: World Ignores Opposition Violence at Venezuela Protests”)

If you want more detail on our oligarch’s hand in all this, their usurping and misusing millions of our tax dollars through institutions like the USAID and the “National Endowment for Democracy” to kill democracy elsewhere under the false banner of fighting FOR democracy (that’s how we have been hoodwinked for ages), you can learn more here:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Why the CIA Won’t Give Up on Venezuela | Interview with Eva Golinger”)

And here is an interview with one of those alleged despots (Venezuela’s Economy Minister):

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Empire Files: Venezuela Economy Minister—Sabotage, Not Socialism, is the Problem”)

In conclusion, you might want to watch (perhaps for the second time?) this summary, previously served up on this site — Tariq Ali’s very insightful, comprehensive summary on what has been happening in Venezuela:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Global Empire – Crisis in Venezuela”)

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This report is from the early phase of the last election cycle, but still very relevant, because we get to see what those few money-aristocrats who control our government and economy look and sound like; how slimy and mendacious at least some of them are.

These are the kinds of human predators who destroy our environment, ruin our lives, and rob us of any say. They are the types who even let us die for their profit in money-making military wars, from pollution, or by gutting our healthcare coverage to fund giant tax breaks for themselves. The ones presented here are only two crooked members of the ruling American aristocracy that, according to the show-cased TV “news” show, consists of about 150 quasi-royal families. Nevertheless, they give us a representative sample. It drives home the point that the oligarchy of the plutocrats doesn’t only exist in theory. No, the thieving and scheming robber billionaires are very real, and they are our world’s personified evil which drives all the rigging against us:

(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Charles Koch Puzzled Everyone Hates Him”)

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CounterPunch Magazine tends to have good articles. The just published Trump’s First Hundred Days of War Crimes is far more worth reading than the title suggests, as it is not yet another insincere resist-Trump-to-distract-us-from-the-source-of-our-problems “news” piece or op-ed. Continue reading →

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Democracy assumes (quite rightly) that power corrupts, at least in most cases, and leads to abuse. Democracy’s cure for this is to prevent the concentration of power by distributing it to as many people as possible. When they act in their self interest, the interests of the many, even of everybody, are taken care of — as opposed to only the interests of a few callous rulers.

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Sometimes it is useful to look over our borders to see how things are going in other countries. It can be like looking into a mirror, or it can provide a contrast which illuminates our own defects or foreshadows future developments that might be coming our way. Continue reading →

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Yesterday, I had the pleasure to sing the praise of Jeff Aronin, the lovely plutocrat who has made his obscene wealth by holding people’s lives hostage (especially their children’s lives – a true lover of kids, apparently). Continue reading →